


with my trust like a child

by Aboutnothingness (Thesherlockholmes), nastally



Category: Queen (Band)
Genre: Compulsory Heterosexuality, F/M, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Toxic Relationships, mentions of assault, uplifting ending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-16 19:53:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29830044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thesherlockholmes/pseuds/Aboutnothingness, https://archiveofourown.org/users/nastally/pseuds/nastally
Summary: Five times Freddie cried on his birthday—and one time he didn't.
Relationships: Freddie Mercury/David Minns, Freddie Mercury/Original Character(s), Jim Hutton/Freddie Mercury, Mary Austin/Freddie Mercury, Winnie Kirchberger/Freddie Mercury
Comments: 53
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [freddieofhearts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/freddieofhearts/gifts).



> A special birthday gift collab about birthdays. 😌🎁💕
> 
> More tags may be added with additional chapters.

_**Tuesday, September 5th, 1961** _

The air is thick and humid as the moisture from this morning's rainfall evaporates under the hot midday sun. The grass squelches—a lush, moist carpet beneath the footfall of the young man with the wheelbarrow making his way along the tall iron fence which separates the school grounds from the outside world. A prestigious enclosure for those young boys whose parents are fortunate enough to give them that which matters most; a proper education. 

The young man who puts down the wheelbarrow and picks up the large gardening shears does not have a proper education. But he has a new position that pays well enough and work that leaves his hands calloused and his arms aching, but doesn't break his back most days, and that is all most men can expect from the world. 

Thinking himself alone in this remote part of the school grounds, he begins to sing a tune under his breath. One of the old songs he doesn't know all the words to, or perhaps he would if he tried, if he were sitting at the kitchen table while the scent of Nānī's cooking filled the room. These things are more easily remembered then. 

But it doesn't matter. The clipping of the shears becomes rhythmical with the melody. 

Months of rain are slowly coming to an end now. The earth is so saturated, so richly fed, that nature flourishes wildly. All the zinnias are already in bloom, a wealth of them stretching out in a long row to his right, up to where they reach the side of a brick wall. Their long stems and bright heads sway lightly in the breeze which provides momentary relief from the sticky heat. 

The array of colours - hues of pink and purple, red and yellow - distracts the eye, and hides the deep red of the school uniform from sight, which blends in between the flowers as if it were part of the garden. That is perhaps its owner's intention, for he hasn't moved since the gardener's arrival. 

With his back to the brick wall, the boy sits on the ground at the end of the row of flowers, in his dark grey shorts and scuffed black leather shoes, his white shirt that isn't tucked in properly on one side, and his crimson blazer. 

He has made himself as small as possible, his skinny frame taking up only the most vitally important fraction of space. Legs pulled up close to his chest and head bent low, he peers just over the top of where his arms are folded on his knees, and through the gaps between the flowers. 

By the time the gardener notices he is there at all, the boy has been watching him warily for some time.

Neither of them was expecting company. 

Like a cornered animal, the boy has stayed put, afraid to draw attention to himself if he should try to leave. But this means that inevitably, he is seen. 

He isn't invisible after all, much as he would like to be. 

Much as he would like to lie down here amidst the reds and pinks and purples, close his eyes, and simply sink into the flowerbed. Cease to be—if only until he has the strength again, the _will_ again, to face the world. 

Only it isn't, is it? This is not the world.

Oh, he longs to be out in the world. To go somewhere nobody knows him and leave behind the prison of ineluctable humiliation this wretched place has become. To think that he had hoped that maybe another year would be different. But one more summer changes nothing.   
And right now the eventual freedom he is longing for seems as far out of reach as the birds in the sky. 

He's contemplated running away. But he knows he won't. Like so many other things, that is just a fantasy. 

And anyway, he may be many things, but he is too proud for that. The ultimate act of cowardice. Then again— _Some have been thought brave because they were afraid to run away._

The gardener has stopped singing now and lowers the shears, squinting at him in the bright sunlight, his face dark in the shade of the straw hat he is wearing. From this distance, he cannot yet see the boy's puffy eyes nor his split lip, which the boy is sorely reminded of when he tries to stretch it over his teeth. The flecks of blood on the sleeve of his blazer have dried and left barely visible stains on the red material. 

Of course, it doesn't take all that to see that the boy is upset and does not wish to be found. The young man with the pruning shears hesitates. Then, he adjusts his hat and wipes his brow with the back of his hand, bending down to collect a handful of freshly clipped twigs to toss them into the wheelbarrow. 

When he looks up again the boy has lowered his head onto his arms. The gardener frowns. So pitifully dejected does he look, sitting there, that the young man can't find it in himself to pay him no mind. 

(Perhaps he, too, knows what it is to be that boy.)

He glances around. It isn’t that he is explicitly forbidden to talk to the students… and anyway, it will be lunchtime shortly and there is no one around. Finally, he takes a few steps forward until he won't have to raise his voice quite so much to be heard. 

"Kya tum theek ho?"

The boy's head jerks up, dark eyes catching the young man's gaze for a moment before he turns away—though there isn't anywhere to turn. And so, he rubs his face and begins to unfold, to push himself up against the wall. No use pretending he isn't here now or trying to get away unseen. If he is perfectly honest with himself, perhaps a part of him longed to be spoken to. For somebody to ask that question: _Are you alright?_

That is what the gardener is asking, because it must be, and the scraps of Hindi he's familiar with confirm it. 

But it isn't a language he can answer in, not properly. And besides, faced with the reality of a stranger who feels much too close even though he is still several feet away, the boy doesn't know what to do with the sympathy extended to him.   
He brushes off his shorts and keeps his head low, but hesitates to move from where he has come to stand, leaning against the wall. He tries to think of something to say before he hurries away. It seems rude not to, now.

"Are you fine?" the gardener asks in heavily-accented English, coming a little closer still.

The boy isn't as small or young as he first appeared. The sharp angles of manhood are already taking shape in the form of an angular jaw and long limbs, all of it in that awkward in-between state, the vestiges of childhood still evident where they have not yet fully matured. Ears sticking out and a too-large mouth. Finally, the swollen upper lip draws the gardener’s attention. 

"Somebody hits you?" he asks. 

‘Not off to a good start,’ he thinks, ‘are you, my friend?’ The school year has barely begun, after all.

The boy's fingers absently brush over his lip as he shakes his head.

"You hit back," the gardener gives him a small grin, tilting his head to the side and half-heartedly miming a punch to his own jaw.

The boy meets his eyes for a moment and shakes his head again, the ghost of a mirthless smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

If only it were that easy. Simple as black and white. Pain and pleasure. Love and hate.

But nothing is.

It isn’t easy or simple when what should be passion, should feel like affection, turns violent and frightening in the blink of an eye. But that is because the fear is always there within them. And it is he who was a fool, after all, to harbour romantic notions of reunions. All that pent-up, repugnant desire—it can go two ways. 

_You see? This is the price you pay for your sins,_ a voice that doesn’t sound like his own whispers at the back of his mind. Only, it has become his own and it speaks the truth.

And anyway, perhaps none of it would be so bad if it weren’t today, of all the days. If he wasn’t still such a _child_ , holding on to infantile expectations that this day would be different from any other. As if the date makes it so, as if that matters to anybody but him. He’s being ungrateful, because it does matter to some—he _has_ friends, however few... who are slowly drifting away from him, and that’s his own fault, too. But what can he do? There are secrets that can’t be told, because they could—and surely would—ruin even the best of friendships.

“Myself, Sanjay.”

The boy looks up again and watches from beneath his lashes as the gardener walks towards him, stopping at a short distance. The man, clad in simple trousers and a plain t-shirt that is no longer the white it once was, is not very tall, but sinewy and broad in the shoulders. His arms are as sun-tanned as his face beneath the frayed straw hat which casts a patchy pattern of sunlight across his features. His green eyes appear lighter, contrasted against his dark skin. Striking and curious. Perhaps even kind.

“Freddie,” the boy murmurs.

“Nice to meet you, Freddie.” When Sanjay smiles, he looks young. Nothing like the stern-faced schoolmasters, prim and proper and unforgiving. “Kya hua?”

Freddie shrugs his shoulders a little, the look on his face half embarrassed and half apologetic. “Mujhko Hindi nahĩ ati.”

At this, the gardener can’t help but laugh. “But you – yes, you speak!”

His amusement coaxes an abashed smile from Freddie, although he lowers his eyes again. “I only know a – a few things. Like how to say I don’t,” he swallows, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth, “speak it, that is.”

“Okay.” Sanjay shrugs and cocks his head to the side, resting the shears against his shoulder as he looks the boy up and down once more. Slower, this time, and with a scrutiny that makes Freddie squirm, inwardly drawing his attention to every part of him that is ungainly. He feels caught out, as though his thoughts were all too apparent, when a smirk tugs at the corners of Sanjay’s mouth. “Bad day.” The words are more of an acknowledgement than a question. Sanjay’s brows draw together as he indicates Freddie’s split lip with a nod, his gaze lingering there. “Bad boys na?”

Freddie meets his eyes. _Bad boys._ The truth is that he knows who is to blame. Knows he doesn’t deserve sympathy.

Because bad boys deserve what comes to them when they go looking for trouble.

“It’s fine,” he mutters quietly and draws his arms tighter around himself, looking down at the tips of his shoes. The sound of the shears clipping through the stem of a flower makes him jerk his head up a moment later.

The gardener is holding a large zinnia in full bloom, it’s yellow-golden colour almost luminous in the sun.

“Yellow.” His smile is a little playful now, a little cheeky. All of a sudden there is a tightness in Freddie’s chest that isn’t altogether unpleasant. “Like happiness,” Sanjay says, and glances up at the sky before his eyes return to Freddie. “Like sun.” He holds the flower out to the boy, who is blushing like a girl, eyes wide and glinting as he takes it. The man’s smile widens into a grin as he winks at the boy, who seems right now as delicate as the flower in his hands. “You see? Good day.”

Freddie’s face feels hot and that dreadful lump in his throat is back again, all at the same time. 

“Good day,” he echoes in a whisper. It’s all he can manage before he presses his lips together, afraid to make a sound. Because he doesn’t know if he’ll laugh or cry.

Because it is today, of all the days.

Because the man with the curious, green eyes ( _kind_ , Freddie decides) who has just gifted him a pretty flower can’t know—how could he possibly know?—that today is his fifteenth birthday.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *teenage angst intensifies*

**_Sunday, September 5th, 1965_ **

The radio irritates him, so much so that his arms are tense—muscles primed to move, but forced into stillness as he resists the urge to reach over and turn it off. _As if silence were better, as if you can stand it._

The radio is guarding his solitude.

The music, turned up loud, is a ‘Keep Out’ sign his family respects—at least for the time being. He will have to leave his room soon enough, but so little does he want to, that every additional minute he is granted feels precious. 

It’s cruel irony, Freddie thinks, staring at the near-empty page in front him. _You’ve done nothing with the day, nothing, your last day and you’ve wasted it away like every other day_. The pencil in his hand quivers. 

There used to be _worlds_ inside him, great, glittering and vast—just waiting to spill onto the page. But now when he stares at the paper, it’s as though he is hollow.

It’s the sickly anticipation of the inevitable that paralyses—like lying awake at night, counting the hours until dawn. That will be him tonight, too, no doubt. Nothing to look forward to and everything to dread; family supper and the start of a new term. _Oh, but you are ridiculous_. Such trivial things, childish things, he should laugh at himself heartily, not lie here with a lump in his throat, full of selfish pity. 

When does it come, Freddie wonders, the day you outgrow it, the day you are free of the ineptitude and the fears and limitations of childhood?

 _It doesn’t_ , he’s coming to realise with a dull sort of horror. Growing up is not something that happens to you. It is something you _do_ , and he’s incapable of it. He doesn’t know how to do it. For all that has changed, nothing really, fundamentally has.

And to think, how he used to long for a different world where nobody knows him. Not his past nor his name. A fresh start, a renaissance—the re-invention of Freddie Bulsara. 

Freddie swallows and lowers his cheek onto the pillow, eyes unfocused. For all the hope that once hinged on the idea of rebirth, he feels extremely foolish now. Because he should have known. It isn’t as though he hasn’t been told often enough. _What’s wrong with you? Why can’t you be – Why aren’t you – Why won’t you—_

Because he can’t. This is him.

The faults ingrained in him are unchangeable, they can’t be erased. He cannot _be_ any other way. And so wherever he goes, ridicule and animosity will follow. 

Only, he thought that he might escape it if he could pretend well enough, but evidently he can’t even do that. It’s impossible because he doesn’t know _what_ it is, what he needs to do differently; how it is he needs to speak, to move, to express himself to be –

 _Just like everybody else?_

Something inside him balks at the thought. That is what makes it so hard: there is an art to being different, being special—does every man believe himself to be? Surely, Freddie thinks, he must. And yet, some people truly are. Some people are special, but it isn’t enough to be different in order to be special, no, you must be different in a way that invites admiration and awe. Not mockery and rejection. 

It isn’t as though he hasn’t tried to go unnoticed entirely, but perhaps it was too late, then. The damage had already been done. His own fault, really, once again. He went about it the wrong way at the start and doomed himself. Perhaps he shouldn’t have tried to feign confidence first, embracing his _otherness_ boldly in front of them, laughing at himself before they could - the Persian popinjay, ladies and gents, on display for your entertainment!

The thought of walking back into that classroom tomorrow morning, for another year at Polytech, ties his stomach in knots—abject loneliness is easier to bear when you are alone than in a room full of people. Disdainful looks cast his way all day, whether he opens his mouth or not, and not a word spoken to him, unless it’s a jab. Whispers and sneers and a bag knocked into the back of his head as someone passes behind his chair. ‘Oh, _sorry._ ’ Stifled laughter that still rings in his ears when he leaves the classroom.

Freddie lifts his head again, resting it heavily in his hand. Dinner must be almost ready. The faint smell of his mother’s cooking has penetrated his room.

It isn’t fair. On the one day that is supposed to be his, he is more bound than any other. It is the simplest, most inoffensive of requests—to just be left alone today. But it won’t be granted. 

He _must_ celebrate, _must_ be grateful for the efforts made on his behalf—which he didn’t ask for— _must_ sit through a festive meal with his family, pretending all the while that he doesn’t know how much they must pity him for the friends he doesn’t have, the telephone calls he hasn’t received today. The summer he has spent cooped up in here alone. 

A strong gale of wind rattles the window pane and the room darkens. Freddie glances at the sky outside, where dark clouds roll swiftly along over the rooftops—the weather’s turning grim. Another tepid British summer has been and gone, his second already. One would think he’d be used to it by now. 

One would be wrong.

Such small things, but impossible to get accustomed to. How there’s always a chill in the shade. A shirt pulled off the clothes horse, always a little damp to the touch. Not the right kind of dampness, the stuffy-heat-dampness that will be followed by blue skies and sun so blinding it hurts your eyes. Other things hurt here. Barely afternoon, and already it is as though the day has passed. Freddie shivers and looks down at the paper, the tip of his pencil listlessly chasing a line on the paper that isn’t turning into anything, not art nor words.

_Help! I need somebody…_

For the past hour, the radio has been playing nothing but sentimental dross and cheery tunes that feel empty, making a mockery of the real emotions they seek to convey: love songs that sound saccharine and false—just meaningless platitudes strung together—and groovy rock n’ roll records that fail to resonate. None of it is what he wants to hear right now.

_Help me if you can, I’m feeling down…_

You must be happy on your birthday. That is the point of them, that is what they are for, to show everybody just how jolly glad you are to be alive.

And what if you can’t be? 

What is the point in birthdays, then, what is the _point_ –

Tossing the pencil down onto the bed, Freddie sits up abruptly and reaches for the radio on the windowsill, cutting the new Beatles record short. It fades into static and a cacophony of sounds before a familiar orchestral sequence catches his attention. Freddie slowly tunes into the station and turns the volume up the rest of the way. The rousing crescendo of the _Ride of the Valkyries_ fills the room and washes over him in all its grandiose, defiant magnificence. 

For a few long moments, Freddie sits very still, his jaw tense, while his insides churn with tumultuous emotion—creating a simmering _rage_ , a frustration so deep he imagines screaming at the top of his lungs, imagines breaking everything around him to pieces, tearing down every poster in the room, ripping up his notebook and swinging the chair against the wall until the wood splinters. 

But all it amounts to are the welts in his palms when he digs his nails into them, and silent, angry tears spilling down his cheeks.

The sudden knock on the door makes his breath catch and his heart drop.

“Freddie!” his sister calls through the door, over the sound of the music.

“ _What_ ,” Freddie snaps, furiously rubbing his face dry on his sleeve as he turns around on the bed just in time for Kash to poke her head in. “I’m _busy_ , do you mind?”

“What are you listening to?” she asks, frowning as she glances between him and the radio.

“Wagner.” Freddie surreptitiously dabs the corner of his eye while Kashmira gives him a long look.

“Okay, well, mum says come to the table. The food’s ready.”

“Alright, I’ll be there in a minute,” he replies curtly, turning away to put the volume down a little.

“It’s ready _now_ ,” Kash informs him, sounding every bit like their mother.

“I know!” Freddie retorts, perhaps harsher than she deserves.

“Well, don’t rush.” A definite note of irritation has entered his sister’s voice. “It’s only your birthday supper and _your_ favourite food we made.”

Freddie meets her eyes again with a mutinous stare. “I said I’ll come in a minute, alright! What more do you want from me?”

“Al _right_.” Kash rolls her eyes, none too subtly, and turns to look over her shoulder. “He’s coming in a minute! He’s just _really busy_ being sad to Wagner –”

“SHUT UP!” Before she can quite finish the sentence, Freddie is on his feet and pushes the door shut and her out of the room with it.

“ _Freddie!_ ” comes his mother’s shout from the kitchen, his outburst not having gone unnoticed.

There’s an offended thump against the door. “I made you a cake, you git!”

Freddie drops his forehead against the door and screws his eyes shut, wishing the world would cave in on itself and take him with it.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Wednesday, September 5th, 1973** _

It has begun to drizzle when they leave the house, the fine spray of rain visible in the light of the streetlamps. Freddie opens the umbrella, which was thoughtfully thrust into his hands by his mother just minutes ago, when they were putting their shoes on. Mary hooks her arm through his to take shelter, and they start down the road together, headed for the station to catch one of the last trains back to the centre of London.

The weather always turns right around his birthday. It always has, come to think of it. His birthday used to signify the end of torrential rain and the gradual return of sunny days. But that was a long time ago. He has long since become used to the opposite; summer is over now, days grow shorter and nights grow colder.

It isn’t so bad when you have somebody to keep you warm at night. Or it shouldn’t be.

Mary reaches into her pocket and fishes out her pack of cigarettes. “Do you mind?”

“No, of course not,” Freddie says lightly, his mind still lingering in the family home they’ve just left behind.

They stop for a moment while Mary lights her cigarette and takes a puff. “You alright?” she asks gently, casting him a sideways glance.

Freddie gives her a nod and a small smile in return. Why wouldn’t he be? It has been a pleasant evening, as far as visits to his parents' house go. And just as well, because he doesn’t know when he will see his family next. Queen’s first real national tour is starting in a week’s time, and it has been the source of much excitement. It’s all that should occupy him at the moment.

So why dwell on the way his father barely acknowledged anything Freddie had to say about the tour, or the record, and everything else he’s pouring every last bit of his creativity, time and energy into? Evidently, even when he proves all expectations of failure wrong and succeeds, it still isn’t enough. It will never be enough. Queen could sell out the entire tour and the record could sell a million copies and still it wouldn’t earn him so much as a ‘good for you’, would it, Freddie thinks bitterly. Nothing will ever be enough to atone for lost respect and for dashing the high hopes his father had for him –

Mary’s quiet chuckle interrupts his train of thought. It’s for the best. Freddie blinks, trying to dispel the plaguing, spiralling thoughts as he turns to her, one eyebrow raised.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Mary answers his questioning gaze, which most certainly means that it is definitely something. She takes another drag from her cigarette and exhales the smoke through a smile. “I was just thinking…” 

“Tell me,” Freddie prompts, and immediately wishes he hadn’t when she does.

“Your mother would be beside herself if we ever did get engaged, wouldn’t she.”

Ah.

With a little hum of agreement, Freddie lowers his eyes to the wet pavement and their footfall, side by side. The beige tips of Mary’s boots and his black platform shoes, large and inelegant by comparison. Well. This has done the trick, at least. He is no longer so preoccupied about what his father does or doesn’t think of him.

“Yes, I’m sorry about her,” is the first thing he thinks to say, because it isn’t a complete evening at the Bulsara home if his mother hasn’t managed to insert at least half a dozen none-too-subtle hints concerning marriage and children into two hours of polite conversation.

“I don’t mind,” Mary says after a moment’s silence. “You know I like your mother, she’s very sweet.”

And she’s not the only one hinting, Freddie thinks, the close-lipped smile on his face a little rigid as a bottomless sort of sensation takes hold in the pit of his stomach. As though he’s slipping and there isn’t anywhere to hold on. He huffs out a laugh and steals the cigarette out of Mary’s hand impulsively, sucking a small puff into his mouth before he hands it back. 

“She’ll simply have to wait,” he tells her archly. “Until I’m obscenely rich and outrageously famous, so I can afford to make an honest woman out of you, my dear. We’ll have live doves at the reception. Or better yet!” he exclaims, over Mary’s laughter. “Live butterflies, entire swarms of them.”

His girlfriend leans her head against his shoulder for a moment, squeezing his arm tightly—as tight as his heart feels, trapped in his chest under the weight of inevitability. A sensation that is entirely at odds with what he knows he _ought_ to feel.

Because everything is perfect. Isn’t it? With Queen on the trajectory to success at last, fingers crossed, and Mary by his side—everything is perfect. Perfect as a pretty picture. Because he loves her, doesn’t he? He cares for her dearly and this is what she deserves. A ring on her finger, a magnificent wedding. A beautiful home and children, one day. 

His mother will be so happy. Perhaps even his father will find it in him to forgive him for the follies of his youth. He’s been good, oh, hasn’t he been good? _As good as a licentious, dishonest wretch can be_ , his own thoughts mock him darkly. 

The truth is ugly.

He knows what he’s done, even if she doesn’t. The desires he continues to succumb to, like an addict to the opiate that is killing him. Swearing each moment of weakness will be the last. And breaking his own promise, every time. He does feel like dying, then. When he slips into bed with her after another ‘rehearsal running late’, ‘a few drinks at the pub, dear’, ‘needed a breath of fresh air before bed’. He can scrub himself clean for hours, but he feels filthy for days beside her. 

It’ll have to stop, of course. Once she wears his ring around her finger. 

The uncompromising finality of that thought sends an unexpected surge of emotion through him, like a punch to the solar plexus. Because the decision is made, isn’t it? The path his life will take is laid. And it is the _right_ one, he only has to follow it.

The rain is pattering down harder around them now, the train station in sight, illuminated by the yellow glow of the street lamps. The lights develop a glare as his vision blurs. Freddie blinks his eyes rapidly a few times and swallows. But it’s nothing — nothing.

Just the cigarette smoke getting in his eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

**_Sunday, September 5, 1976_ **

The door slams, the lingering smell of celebratory champagne hovers around antique furniture, and Freddie weeps in its midst.

The silk of the brocaded loveseat was thankfully missed by any thrown drink or broken glass that could snag the delicate threads. Here he is curled in on himself: bare feet tucked up onto the cushion, knees gathered up under his chin, arms wrapped around his legs. Through the sheen of tears he can see the roses David had brought him only an hour ago. They’re set in a crystal vase. Perfectly arranged, proudly displayed on the main table of the room, surrounded by photographs full of love and good memories.

What a sham. What a lie.

He’s given up trying to stem his tears, they slip heavily down his cheeks to his neck and settle into the hollow where his collarbones are forced forward by his position. Waterlogged, every bit of him. Unlike the flowers, this water does him no good. It ruins, it deadens. He is another broken thing surrounded by shards of glass.

Somewhere in the place where his heart should be—if he had one—there’s a horrid ache, sore as an open wound. Drawing his attention to it forces a choked whimper out of him, and he shudders, shattered by his own vulnerability—even here, alone, it’s embarrassing.

The whole picture, Freddie thinks, if someone were to paint it, would be a mockery to all who saw it.

Inside him there is nothing but need—overwhelming, drowning. These tears are too much alone—the fears producing them are another matter entirely.

No one wants someone who will weep at anything—David jabbed that he would tear up over a pretty window. Well, that’s going a bit far. Even thinking of the joke, though, brings protestation: maybe not that, exactly, but you carefully never watch films in David’s presence, and you’ve made good work of hiding away your childish reaction to large crowds of strangers at parties; increasingly difficult, isn’t it, not to be frightened? Fame is a relatively new thing. So many things to unsettle you, but he doesn’t know the extent of what that means, what your visceral reaction is. Thank Heaven he’s away so often, think if he saw your weaker moments: the nightmares—or the worse things—the reasons you choose when and what to eat. Some of that he can appreciate, the result of it. But you? Frighten off the fellow who dares touch you—or no, hide rather. Yes, hide it all—the softness, the unrelenting tears.

Some things can be rightfully coaxed out, others wrongly—some things he hasn’t wanted to give, but did anyway and for good reason. After all, is that not the point of it all? To be yourself, at last. To be honest—to no longer pretend, at least not with the person you love. At least not all the time.

But he is far too much for anyone. The extent of his feelings must remain hidden—covered over and then over again.

All of this, threading in silver-terror, assures nothing will change. Not now, after all these years—everything is unwillingly ingrained. Shadows are still horrors, echoing from them old voices, memories containing the delicate pain of a wisp needle. Everyone leaves you, when they realise where you’ve been breached and broken.

After you trails loneliness. A bright figure, paled by useless, continued hope. It’s always been there, the steady reinforcer of crushed dreams. So many things follow him in the shadows—shimmering unsure visions, slivers of forgotten pain; aren’t they all finely beautiful, as long as you don’t look too closely?

Freddie’s eyes feel dulled as he glances around the room: the empty townhouse he has tried to make a home, a beautiful thing. More memories spring up—the well of past hurt beginning to brim. This is the only home he has ever been entirely welcome in. That too now is false, even though it’s his own.

There, on the table beside the fireplace, an oriental vase. David had pointed it out to him, had thought it suited his taste. And over there, the first woodblock he purchased and hung with such pride, such happiness. And there, the simplest of all in this grand house, a photo of them together.

The house itself: the failed home.

Rage has burned out, and now the unease of hurt laps at him, spreading out into the room, the air still with it. He cowers as it pervades, too lost to find any solid personal recusal and, upon turning the matter over in his mind, finds no one to blame but himself.

Unworthy of love, not built for keeping another close. After all, he said you were heartless. And he’s right, isn’t he?

Another year, another failure. Another heart you’ve broken.


	5. Chapter 5

**_Wednesday, September 5, 1984_ **

Winnie doesn’t know it’s his birthday. Quite purposefully—because he doesn’t want any fuss, isn't interested in it—Freddie hasn’t mentioned it to him or Barbara. Of course, perhaps Phoebe will already have organised something—some surprise—and he’ll happily go along with it for a few hours, or Paul will come knocking and Freddie will ignore him. But really, the gnawing in his stomach will be better eased by a night in than one out—he’s sensible enough to know that, by now.

Perhaps it’s the stress of the album, or the uncertainty that comes with living in unfamiliar territory. He’s been in Germany often enough over the years and now for a stretch—that doesn’t mean he’s comfortable though, or as comfortable as he is in London. The language still falls foreign on his ears, and though he knows main roads and all the best places in town, he acknowledges he doesn’t truly know the city like he knows Kensington… or did, back in the day—it’s probably changed by now. And things with Winnie certainly aren’t to fuss over. He’s living with him happily, stout German food notwithstanding—it’s horrid on his stomach, and initially called up worse, nearly forgotten, memories of India: of hot summers, and lonelier birthdays.

In the relative peace of Munich, he is settled. There’s a flurry out in the world, but he’s safe from it here. Now, drawn out languorously on the sofa, he thumbs through an auction catalogue, a television programme murmuring in the background. The catalogue is in German and he squints at the words. Oddly, they always individually seem so similar to English, but when he tries to put them together he loses the meaning.

_Dieses Stück stammt aus dem 18. Jahrhundert und ist in gutem Zustand. Es zeigt die Gottesmutter nach dem Tod Christi …_

He grows tired from trying to work it out and examines the picture instead. That’s only half the interest though—he’s always liked to know where the pieces originate from, what their style is characterised by, why it’s important. Quite a lot he learned in art college and the specifics came later: why one piece was more valuable, or sold for more; the particular politics that are present in auction houses, that he never much cared for, and ignored.

The art pieces seem to blur on the page, and he closes his eyes, leaning his head back to rest on the arm of the sofa. He’s been exhausted lately, bone-weary, too many late nights at the studio—because he has recorded and discarded three different songs now—and too many nights waiting up for Winnie to come home from the restaurant; because, more than anything else, he wants this relationship to last, and if playing the housewife will keep it, then he’ll try his hardest.

Winnie is so kind, doesn’t lose his temper as much as Bill did, and he’s even given him a ring. They have a lovely home, even if Winnie detests antiques and has got rid of many favourite pieces Freddie has attempted to bring in. Perhaps they can’t have a conversation without Barbara—and even that he is occasionally sceptical of; sometimes expressions don’t seem to match words—but who needs that? It hardly seemed to have mattered much in the past.

And… he _is_ happy. Munich holds nearly everything that could keep him entertained and anything it doesn’t, well, he’ll be back with the band and off on tour soon enough—that holds everything else. Before Winnie—that’s difficult to think of. He’s not the sort to throw life away, but going like he was… some priorities get shadowy, fleeting, difficult to understand. The hard task of living is a skill he’s still continually trying to learn.

So, he needs this. It’s all he knows; pain or not, contentment or not.

Winnie is hardly difficult to please. And Freddie has got very good by now at hiding his tendency to cling. Here, finally embodying the Freddie everyone thinks he is, he receives hardly any rejection.

And it’s not as if pretending is such a crime—look at everyone, no one really is true, are they?

As long as he stays just as he is, sending antiques to London and hiding his tears and insecure moments, Winnie will keep him and hold him.

Another thing you’ve said before—how many times? And in the end they grow bored even of this, even of this accommodating sheen you’ve painted on. When that happens, where will you be? Old now, not a young little thing any longer. No one, not a soul, will care for you then. Mustn’t lose this, mustn’t step awry.

He lights a cigarette, coughing on the exhale, and pulls himself out of the reverie before it turns—inevitably—worse, and tries again to decipher the German.

Pointless, a tapestry he can’t unravel. A weaving of Mother Mary, eyes filled with tears over her dead son.

On the television, the reporter turns serious with that particular tone used for grave news, no matter the language, “Uns jetzt zu weiteren Berichten aus Amerika über die Krankheit, die Männer befällt…”

Freddie picks up the phone, but before he can make a call to Phoebe about the antiques, he feels dreadfully sick.

Happy Birthday—fuck, everything comes around in a circle.


End file.
